Kleenex Issue

(1). When your product or service becomes synonymous with it’s function. (i.e. Kleenex is a brand of tissue, not the tissue itself, and Google is a search engine, yet people use the brand name as the actual action of searching. See, now you get it, and if you don’t and are upset about not getting it, then grab a Kleenex and go Google it, lady).

“You see Ted, your problem is that you have somewhat of a Kleenex issue on your hands. On one hand, everyone knows your product and brand, on the other, nobody can differentiate between the two and your competitors use both in all of their marketing material. Guess that patent idea I gave you 10 years back makes a whole lot of sense now, doesn’t it Ted?”

PAY OUR BILLS

RANDOM LINGO

(1). An unofficial procedure that a small, smug subset of employees deems better than those of their peers.

“Well, as a best practice, my team always sends each of our clients a personalized holiday card and a little tin of cookies. Our client retention rate is 0.1% better than the firm average, so it’s clearly worth it.”

(1). An unnecessary (but sonecessary) document a company uses to tout previous accomplishments and put stars in the eyes on new prospects so that they hire them. Usually they are only created around well-known brands, because nobody cares that you helped that company down the hall do great…what do those guys do again? Something with David Bowie memorabilia right?

“We’d like to show you acase study that we did for a company that sells David Bowie memorabilia. Wait a minute, Mike! I told you to make a case study for the Chloé site, not the David Bowie site! When we get back to the office we’re gonna be making some ch ch ch changes!”